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Beryl McKenzie
Beryl McKenzie was a Canadian Slayer active in Nova Scotia in 1969. Biography Beryl McKenzie was born in 1951 in Canada. In the winter of 1956, at the age of 5, she was placed in the care of the Watcher Miranda Valance by her parents after Beryl is identified as a Potential Slayer. By 1969, Beryl is seventeen years old and lives with Miranda in Halifax and awaits the call to be Chosen. That summer, while on her run around the city, Beryl happens upon a demonstration protesting the Vietnam War. Soon the police show up and throw tear gas into the crowd; people scatter in a frenzy and in the midst of the chaos, Beryl tries to save a local boy named Jesse who was seriously injured. Unfortunately, Jesse dies in Beryl's arms and with him the part that believed the endurance and goodness of mankind died with him and she lost hope in the human race. A week after the demonstration, with her Watcher in England at a retreat, Beryl makes a trip to the neighborhood grocery story, owned by Jesse's family, to offer her condolences; his father, believing her to be a friend from a commune in the mountains called Moonstone, begins telling Beryl about the joys of communal living and it sparks something in Beryl. Beryl then rushes home to pack a bag and hitchhikes to Moonstone. Upon arrival, Beryl meets Anna Maloney, the grocers daughter and Jesse's sister, she gives Beryl a guided tour and through their conversations Beryl discovers Anna is a witch who had a vision of her arrival and is part of the commune circle who practice natural magic in accordance with the spirits of nature. In her first day she also meets Lennox, an American draft dodger with whom Beryl develops an attraction to. After a week of living at Moonstone, Beryl has a vivid dream about the death of the active Slayer and as she died in the dream, Beryl obtains her Slayer powers. The next morning she is mortified at the realization that she has been called after dedicating her life to peace that she reveals her true identity to Anna in the hopes the coven can use magic to take the power out of her and prays the Council doesn't find her before that happens. A week after coming into her power, Miranda Valance shows up at Moonstone to take Beryl back to Halifax. Beryl, with the aid of her new friends, firmly refuses the calling and Ms. Valance, appearing to relent, tells her if mutiny is the path she chooses, there is a mystical compound she can give her over the course of a few days prior to her eighteenth birthday. Beryl agrees but Anna doesn't trust Miranda is being altogether truthful. However, over the next few days, Beryl consumes the compound and it does exactly as Miranda stated it would and drained Beryl's Slayer powers. The night before her eighteenth birthday, she awakens and looks for Lennox and Miranda tells her she sent him on a mission to retrieve one last ingredient for the plan to reverse her Slayer powers; Beryl knows where he went based on Miranda's descriptions and choose to follow after him. After Beryl leaves, Anna, through touching Miranda, has a vivid vision of what's to come-a plan to reawaken Beryl's Slayer bloodlust through a test called the Cruciamentum by entrapping her with a vampire in the sea caves nearby. Miranda and Anna fight briefly before Anna leaves to warn Lennox and save Beryl. In the sea caves, Beryl gets lost but eventually comes upon a man whom she believes to be trapped and she tries to help him. He reveals himself to be a vampire and as she tries to escape, she happens upon Lennox's dead body and runs to escape. The vampire follows, chasing her into the frigid water where he tries to drown her. Beryl grabs a piece of driftwood and stakes the vampire. As she emerges from the water victorious, she comes to the heart-wrenching realization she was never meant to know love or a normal life and vows to be the Slayer as long as the Council keeps finding her things to kill. Beryl eventually dies some time after her Cruciamentum, activating a Slayer in Poland. Appearances * Tales of the Slayer: Back to the Garden McKenzie McKenzie McKenzie